2699 Bureaucracy

Monday, December 14, 2009

It's impossible to learn what you think you already know.

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Bureaucrats are driving me crazy.

• There's an uncashed check for Jay being held by the state of New York. I filled out the form to claim it, checking the "deceased" block, and signing it as widow, sole heir, and executor of his estate. I got another form back from them. They want Jay's signature on the form. (Um, he's dead - that's what deceased means.) Also proof that he'd done business with the company that issued the check. (Would the company have written him a check if he'd not done business with them?) New York just wants to keep my $350.

• The lab that processes my blood tests has double-billed my insurance company for at least two procedures on two separate dates. The insurance company paid both the original bills and the duplicates, and sent me the information on my copay on the duplicates (which I'd already paid the first time it was billed). The lab did not send me a duplicate bill. Odd.

• The lab sent me three checks, for like $1.34, $2.17, and $.72, marked as refunds for overpayment. There's no indication which invoices I am supposed to have overpaid. I never overpaid.

• The lab has sent overdue notices for two invoices. The notices do not say which invoices are overdue, either by service date or invoice number, and the amounts due do not match any already paid invoices. I have no outstanding bills from them, and no procedures that are missing bills.

• The lab does not provide a phone number, and I know from experience that they don't read letters.

• My bank "deactivated" one of my three accounts because there had been no activity on it in ages. They had also been debiting the account $1 a month as a "low balance fee" (which when you think about it, is ridiculously self-defeating) until I discovered it and added some money to bring it up to the required level. Three months later, they started debiting $3 a month as an "inactivity fee" up until they deactivated it. So I went to the bank today, and pointed out that 1) they should have notified me before deactivation, and 2) that monthly fee should constitute "activity", shouldn't it? So now it's reactivated, and I am going to go online and set up two automatic transfers, to transfer in $1 once a month, and transfer out $1 a few days later, which they assure me will constitute "activity". Which is stupid.
  

• The above had nothing to do with my inability to get any money from the ATM on Saturday. They told me it was a system problem. I pointed out that the guy behind me in line didn't have a problem, and they said the system resets itself every 15 minutes, so I should have just tried again.

• "Try again" isn't that easy. Because there was a car behind me, I'd have to exit to let him out. The entrance is to the left. A left turn out of there is near impossible before 11 pm, so I'd have to "go around the block", which in a village is a meandering 3/4 mile or so. I don't know who plans positions of exits and entrances, but they're nuts.

Is it me, or is the world going crazy?
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